Alan McSkimming hopeful of opportunity to open up gap

Scott Binnie

Alan McSkimming hopes his Carnoustie Panmure side can use the Scottish Cup weekend to make up some ground in the Super League.

The Gowfers’ visit to Musselburgh Athletic is just one of two league fixtures scheduled for this Saturday due to the scheduled cup action and McSkimming says it’s a good chance for Carnoustie to move up the table.

But it will be a tough ask for the Gowfers who have generally struggled to get any points from away games with Musselburgh, despite regularly putting in solid performances.

And after Saturday’s fixture was called off due to widespread snow, Alan is just hoping to get a game played.

He said: “It was frustrating but when you see how widespread the call-offs were, you appreciate how bad the conditions were.

“We thought it would be a wee flurry of snow but the pitch was covered with a good inch of snow and it froze overnight.

“So there was no chance whatsoever of it being on. It was disappointing because it’s that stop-start time of year when you play a game then the next one’s off.

“Musselburgh on Saturday, it’s only one of two league games on this weekend so it’s not only an opportunity for us to take three points but it’s also an opportunity for us to move three or four positions up the league, possibly right into mid-table and that’s where we want to get to.

“It’s a psychological edge closing down teams above us and for teams below us to see a gap open up.

“We need to prepare properly for this and go down there with the right attitude.

“We need to do everything we can to make sure we’re leaving Musselburgh with all three points which is something we’ve not done in a while.

“It’s a team that we’ve always played well against but we’re well due to take the three points, and hopefully Saturday is the time.

“Looking at the forecast it’s looking like it’ll be mild for the time of year, so it’s pretty likely the game will be on which is great.